1926 – General John J. Pershing arrived at Key West on the USS Denver. He came from the Panama Canal Zone after an extended trip to South America. He then took the train to Washington.
1941 – The body of Cecilia Thompson Trunks was found at the infamous establishment on Howe Street known as “Alice Reid’s” or “Mom’s Tea Room.” She had been strangled with a silken undergarment.
1949 – The modern Gulfstream Food Department Store on White Street opened. The owners of the new store were Luis and James Muniz.
1960 – Cuban leader Fidel Castro’s personal plane went missing over the Florida Straits enroute from Havana to Miami. Castro was not aboard. Key West’s Civil Air Patrol, Navy aircraft from Boca Chica, and a Coast Guard cutter conducted search and rescue operations.
1964 – The Hemingway House opened as a museum dedicated to telling of the late Nobel and Pulitzer Prize winning author’s life in Key West in the 1930’s.
2015 – Private donors raised $7,500 to have 17 poems written by local poets engraved along various sidewalks throughout Key West.
Information compiled by Dr. Corey Malcom, Lead Historian, Monroe County Public Library, Florida Keys History Center.
Image: The Hemingway House at 906 Whitehead Street viewed from the Key West Lighthouse, ca. 1965. From the Old Island Restoration Foundation Collection. Monroe County Public Library, Florida Keys History Center.